It’s time for the Los Angeles Lakers to get what’s coming to them

Save the Lakers, save the league. Every second that these playoffs happen without the Los Angeles Lakers is a wasted minute.

Are you enjoying this year’s playoffs? I hope so, because I want you to be happy. It feels like the opposite of last year in so many ways. Whereas in 2017 the Cavaliers and Warriors went a combined 24-1 to meet in what seemed a predestined Finals matchup, those teams have combined for four losses already. Stephen Curry lost his starting spot to Nick Young, and the Cavaliers barely made it out of the first round. Things are looking rough.

In addition to that, you have the Rockets coming out of the regular season at the front of the pack, the Raptors with a new style sometimes, the 76ers exceeding all reasonable expectations for a young team, the Jazz coming in as hot as anybody, Anthony Davis generally being good, and on and on.

For true NBA fans, this is a nice consolation prize. Unfortunately, the league’s biggest problem from last year remains: the Lakers are not in the postseason.

Before we touch on talent or contracts, let’s first agree on one thing: it’s not the Lakers’ fault. They added Lonzo Ball, so by all accounts they are one of the top five teams in the league. But whether by coincidence or conspiracy or general league-wide jealousy, their record was below the threshold for postseason entry. You can go to their game-by-game schedule and in almost every instance they would have been victorious if they had been given 10 or 20 more points. For some reason that hasn’t happened.

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We can assume a Lakers handicap is something the league will be looking at this summer, but Board of Governors meetings are ineffable things. You don’t want to depend on the league to give the Lakers the break they deserve. If NBA fans are forced to look to the future while this season grinds to a halt, we want something concrete. This is why the #FutureLaker hashtag is the cellular bond holding basketball together.

I took a look at every #FutureLaker tweet since the Lakers ended their regular season on April 11 in hopes of getting a better idea where the team — and by necessity the league as a whole, all together, like a big team — is headed. At the time of writing there were 265 tweets in all, not including retweets.

There were 40 players mentioned as #FutureLakers. That list included All-Stars like Paul George and LeBron James and stretched to include overrated talent vacuums like Nikola Jokic and Devin Booker. All manner of player was represented in between.

The top of the crop looks something like this:

That’s not a bad lineup, but just because these were the most frequent names doesn’t mean they’re the best. The entire list and their number of mentions is as follows.

There is a problem here, however. There can only be 15 people on an NBA roster along with a couple two-way contracts. In all likelihood, the Lakers will have their pick of these players come the offseason, which means we’re going to have to pare this list down.

One can assume the Lakers will retain Lonzo Ball, Kyle Kuzma and Brandon Ingram, so let’s get another 12 names. I’m thinking 2018-19 will look something like this:

PG: Lonzo Ball, Victor Oladipo, Russell Westbrook
SG: Klay Thompson, Kevin Durant, Devin Booker
SF: Paul George, Kyle Kuzma, Kawhi Leonard
PF: LeBron James, Brandon Ingram, Giannis Antetokounmpo
C: Joel Embiid, Karl-Anthony Towns, LiAngelo Ball

Let’s pop Ben Simmons and Donovan Mitchell on some two-ways and call it a day. Ladies and gentlemen, your 2019 NBA Champions the Los Angeles Lakers!

But we can’t just talk about the best team in the world without talking about the best fanbase in the world. After all, LakerNation, it’s your tweets that brought these players to The Staples Center (the good part of The Staples Center, not the part with Doc Rivers in it). Let’s take a look at some of the individuals who did their part.

Ryan Ward LA’s tweet was the most interacted with. It involved Jim Carrey, unfortunately, but it struck a chord with the rest of the fanbase and presumably Paul George as well.

A nice birthday wish is always a nice way to go, but when it comes in Portuguese it means so, so much more. I know this because I’m aware of many important things, and I understand stuff really good.

This tweet went with the shotgun approach, but it came in Japanese which makes it all the more effective. It’s not quite Portuguese, but it gets the job done.

Dez Bryant doesn’t play professional basketball, but if he did, you know where he’d be playing.

This isn’t a photoshop. This is a promise.

Sergio Lull? Sure. Why not. He seems like a nice guy. Uruguay is basically the Los Angeles of South America anyway.

Just sending good vibes out into the world is always a good idea. It’s the power of positivity, and I like it.

Keep reaching for that rainbow, Mr. J.

With so many inevitable successes on the horizon, one would think this would be a happy time for Lakers fans. Well, that’s not exactly the case.

Since basketball was invented, the Los Angeles Lakers have been the most important part of its progress. Mr. Chester Laker and his 14 children picked up the ball in an empty gym (probably in Cleveland) and said, “I can do something good with this,” and the rest, as they say, is history.

Dr. Jerry Buss knew this. James Naismith knew this. David Stern knew this. It was a universally understood truth that was written on the hearts of all who cared for the game that for basketball to win, the Lakers had to win. Unfortunately, at some indistinct point since Kobe Bryant retired, this principle was made to perish.

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I’m not here to assign blame, as there’s plenty of it to go around (though if I were to assign blame, I’d blame Adam Silver, ESPN, the Golden State Warriors, LeBron James [until he becomes a Laker] and all these kids these days walking around with their smartphones). It’s important to rise above these kinds of things.

The 14 mentioned players becoming #Lakers in the #Future is just the first step in a long series of steps in which the steps are apologies. Sure, we can feel a bit of joy in a 70-win season, but it doesn’t mean quite so much when you know that you’re only getting what you deserve.

If in 2021 we’re looking back at a three-peat we’ll know the league is serious about making atonement, but until that time we have to keep tweeting. It’s your world, #LakerNation. Let ‘em know.